Developing Guidelines for Evaluating, Selecting, and Implementing Suburban Transit Services (2006)

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D-1 APPENDIX D: CASE STUDY METHODOLOGY The methodology for this study was based on four fundamental efforts, described below: • Background research and preliminary analysis focused on reviewing previous studies in the area of suburban transit service, defining “contemporary suburbia”, describing the characteristics of transit services, and exploring the relationships between land use and activity patterns, and how they relate to various types of transit service. • Preliminary case studies generated a wealth of information on a wide range of agencies, identified common issues and trends faced by these agencies, and elucidated how agencies make decisions about what service to implement and how its performance will be measured. This effort also helped identify which agencies operate a variety of service types, which were willing to participate more heavily in the study, and what land-use and operating data they have available. • Detailed case studies offered the opportunity to follow-up with a limited number of agencies to better understand their operating environment, transit services, and political and funding situation, among others. Nine sites were selected and visited by a team member to collect various data, explore the service area, and meet with agency representatives. Qualitative information is being synthesized for each site while the land- use data is being used to generate an activity surface for the region and specific land-use statistics for the service areas of selected services. This information, along with service operating statistics and ridership data, will be used to evaluate the relationship between development or activity patterns and transit service. This work is in progress at the time of this writing. • Guidelines are the final component of the work. This step will synthesize our findings from the detailed case studies and develop guidelines for operators and policy makers that can be used to inform their choice of transit service. In each region, several specific suburban services, such as individual express routes, circulators, flex routes, or dial-a-ride services were selected for more detailed analysis of land- use patterns, service characteristics, and operating performance. The analysis of these sites includes development of a regional activity surface that locates each local service within the context of regional trip making. The surface is used to determine how strong a correlation exists between the topographic features contained in a service area and the service format that is most appropriate. For example, peaks on the surface represent the largest destinations for travel by all modes and are generally served by the highest frequency, highest capacity transit services in a region. They are also frequently the best locations for transit hubs because the concentration of routes serves travel demand from all directions and the concentration of trip ends minimizes the need to transfer. Peaks are frequently served by fixed-route circulator services that provide “last mile” connections to nearby densely developed areas. In contrast, plains are notoriously difficult to serve with fixed-route transit because of the low density, coarsely grained mix of land uses, and lack of well-connected pedestrian facilities frequently found in suburban residential areas. These areas are frequently served by flexible routes or demand-responsive feeder services that connect to regional transit at a peak.

D-2 Several land-use measures were also developed for each local service area, depending on data availability, including: • Service area size • Population density • Household density • Employment density • Jobs - housing balance • Industry mix (relative share of employment by industry) • Land-use mix (relative share of residential, commercial, industrial, and other land uses) • Sidewalk coverage (measure of completeness of pedestrian network) • Street connectivity (measure of grid or cul-de-sac development patterns) • Urban places (whether there is a significant place with walkable urban characteristics of small setbacks and street-fronting “Main Street-style” buildings) • Parking cost (whether there is a significant place in the service area where charges for off-street parking are in effect) • Transit priority features (whether there is are any significant traffic signal priority systems, queue jumper lanes, or bus lanes in the service area) • Service format (e.g. express, fixed-route, flex-route, dial-a-ride) • Service supply (e.g. revenue-hours per day) • Performance (e.g. riders per hour) These statistics provide the basis for the development of guidelines that identify conditions under which specific service formats and service levels have been most effective. In each region, several specific suburban services, such as individual express routes, circulators, flex routes, or dial-a-ride services were selected for more detailed analysis of land- use patterns, service characteristics, and operating performance. The analysis of these sites includes development of a regional activity surface that locates each local service within the context of regional trip making. The surface is used to determine how strong a correlation exists between the topographic features contained in a service area and the service format that is most appropriate. For example, peaks on the surface represent the largest destinations for travel by all modes and are generally served by the highest frequency, highest capacity transit services in a region. They are also frequently the best locations for transit hubs because the concentration of routes serves travel demand from all directions and the concentration of trip ends minimizes the need to transfer. Peaks are frequently served by fixed-route circulator services that provide “last mile” connections to nearby densely developed areas. In contrast, plains are notoriously difficult to serve with fixed-route transit because of the low density, coarsely grained mix of land uses, and lack of well-connected pedestrian facilities

D-3 frequently found in suburban residential areas. These areas are frequently served by flexible routes or demand-responsive feeder services that connect to regional transit at a peak. Several land-use measures were also developed for each local service area, depending on data availability, including: • Service area size • Population density • Household density • Employment density • Jobs - housing balance • Industry mix (relative share of employment by industry) • Land-use mix (relative share of residential, commercial, industrial, and other land uses) • Sidewalk coverage (measure of completeness of pedestrian network) • Street connectivity (measure of grid or cul-de-sac development patterns) • Urban places (whether there is a significant place with walkable urban characteristics of small setbacks and street-fronting “Main Street-style” buildings) • Parking cost (whether there is a significant place in the service area where charges for off-street parking are in effect) • Transit priority features (whether there is are any significant traffic signal priority systems, queue jumper lanes, or bus lanes in the service area) • Service format (e.g. express, fixed-route, flex-route, dial-a-ride) • Service supply (e.g. revenue-hours per day) • Performance (e.g. riders per hour) These statistics provide the basis for the development of guidelines that identify conditions under which specific service formats and service levels have been most effective.